5 ms·

Yeah, I also read that the order to copy CPUs developed by the West has greatly demoralized Soviet engineers working in this field. You should learn from your c

by fuoqi 6y ago

Yeah, I also read that the order to copy CPUs developed by the West has greatly demoralized Soviet engineers working in this field. You should learn from your competitors and build on top of that.

cafard 6y ago
Dijkstra wrote somewhere that the Cold War was effectively over when the Soviet Union decided to copy the IBM 360.
- MichaelMoser123 6y ago
  don't know, developing the s360 line cost ibm 5 billion $ [1] (that was quite a bit of a moon shot, given that the moon program has cost 25 billion $ [2]). Maybe it would have cost them less if the s360 instruction set had a stack, but who knows. In any event this price tag pursuaded them to clone the whole thing. [1] https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-history/silicon-revolution/building-the-system360-mainframe-nearly-destroyed-ibm https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-history/silicon-revolution/bu... [2] https://money.com/apollo-11-moon-mission-cost/ https://money.com/apollo-11-moon-mission-cost/
- PhantomGremlin 6y ago
  US companies also copied the IBM 360. RCA did, perhaps others. US companies also copied the IBM 370. I used a far superior clone computer called the Itel AS/5. Much of the hard work was actually trivial because: ALD's were Automated Logic Diagrams. IBM sold these. They were complete schematics for the S-370. EXSYSCO basically duplicated the logic of the S-370. http://www.silogic.com/NAS/NAS.html http://www.silogic.com/NAS/NAS.html These schematics were freely available in the machine room. I remember perusing them at night when things were slow. Microcode listings were also freely available. (I believe a large part of IBM's openness at the time was because of antitrust litigation). I also remember seeing the Itel engineers using the IBM schematics when debugging problems.
- FuckButtons 6y ago
  Why? The Cold War more or less started with soviet spies stealing the western allies nuclear technology. It’s not like the USSR was standing on their own 2 feet entirely independent of western technology at any point during its existence.
  - jandrese 6y ago
    Because then your engineers won't have learned the lessons from building their own machine. They'll be even further behind when the next generation comes out. At that point the only option is to keep stealing the designs which means you'll always be behind. It's like cheating on your homework, it works at first but then you fail the final.
    - FuckButtons 6y ago
      I don’t disagree with you, but my point is that was more or less the status quo in the USSR.
    - emodendroket 6y ago
      I don't think that's really true because 1) currently developed states like the US got that way in large part by IP theft 2) if this were really true you'd expect it to be a detriment to, e.g., learn well-known algorithms in school instead of deriving them from first principles.
- emodendroket 6y ago
  Doesn't seem right. The US was hardly doomed by the great lengths it went to to copy British textile mills!

by fuoqi 6y ago

Yeah, I also read that the order to copy CPUs developed by the West has greatly demoralized Soviet engineers working in this field. You should learn from your competitors and build on top of that.

cafard 6y ago

Dijkstra wrote somewhere that the Cold War was effectively over when the Soviet Union decided to copy the IBM 360.

MichaelMoser123 6y ago
don't know, developing the s360 line cost ibm 5 billion $ [1] (that was quite a bit of a moon shot, given that the moon program has cost 25 billion $ [2]). Maybe it would have cost them less if the s360 instruction set had a stack, but who knows. In any event this price tag pursuaded them to clone the whole thing. [1] https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-history/silicon-revolution/building-the-system360-mainframe-nearly-destroyed-ibm https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-history/silicon-revolution/bu... [2] https://money.com/apollo-11-moon-mission-cost/ https://money.com/apollo-11-moon-mission-cost/
PhantomGremlin 6y ago
US companies also copied the IBM 360. RCA did, perhaps others. US companies also copied the IBM 370. I used a far superior clone computer called the Itel AS/5. Much of the hard work was actually trivial because: ALD's were Automated Logic Diagrams. IBM sold these. They were complete schematics for the S-370. EXSYSCO basically duplicated the logic of the S-370. http://www.silogic.com/NAS/NAS.html http://www.silogic.com/NAS/NAS.html These schematics were freely available in the machine room. I remember perusing them at night when things were slow. Microcode listings were also freely available. (I believe a large part of IBM's openness at the time was because of antitrust litigation). I also remember seeing the Itel engineers using the IBM schematics when debugging problems.
FuckButtons 6y ago
Why? The Cold War more or less started with soviet spies stealing the western allies nuclear technology. It’s not like the USSR was standing on their own 2 feet entirely independent of western technology at any point during its existence.
- jandrese 6y ago
  Because then your engineers won't have learned the lessons from building their own machine. They'll be even further behind when the next generation comes out. At that point the only option is to keep stealing the designs which means you'll always be behind. It's like cheating on your homework, it works at first but then you fail the final.
  - FuckButtons 6y ago
    I don’t disagree with you, but my point is that was more or less the status quo in the USSR.
  - emodendroket 6y ago
    I don't think that's really true because 1) currently developed states like the US got that way in large part by IP theft 2) if this were really true you'd expect it to be a detriment to, e.g., learn well-known algorithms in school instead of deriving them from first principles.
emodendroket 6y ago
Doesn't seem right. The US was hardly doomed by the great lengths it went to to copy British textile mills!